RSSA Religious Shoot-out
Feb 19th, 2007 | By Eric Hoefler | Category: Folklore/Philosophy[Disclaimer: By making both a "Full Feed" and an "Education Only" feed available at the top of this blog, I sorta' warn that I might write about things not directly tied to education, educational technology, or the classroom. I also say this on the "About" page. Since this is the first time I've really followed through with that since I started updating this blog a few months back, I thought I'd give everyone a heads-up in case they wanted to switch feeds.]
My spiritual beliefs are fairly complex and still evolving (and are informed by a wide range of influences, as a glance at my growing LibraryThing tag cloud will reveal). In my constant search for understanding, I read and consider as many intelligent, informed viewpoints as I can find.
One voice that I’ve been particularly impressed with is Sam Harris and his work The End of Faith. While snooping around online to learn more about Harris, I found a fairly heated “open email exchange” between Harris and Dennis Prager in Jewcy’s “Big Questions” series.
If you’re looking for some lively religious debating, the exchange makes for interesting reading. Start here and follow the thread of entries at the bottom of each post.
In Jewcy’s words:
Why are atheists so angry? Sam Harris and Dennis Prager inaugurate Jewcy’s “Big Question” series by arguing this very question. In the Big Question, passionate thinkers will debate the weightiest, most contentious issues of the day via e-mail.
Author of the thundering anti-theist polemics The End of Faith and Letter to a Christian Nation, Harris may just be the Thomas Paine of an emerging movement to wrench religion out of American life.
Prager is a nationally syndicated talk radio host who trumpets the virtues of the Judeo-Christian tradition. For the next four days, each of them will send us one e-mail per day.
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“My spiritual beliefs are fairly complex and still evolving”
One day I hope you are touched by His noodly appendage thus bringing an end to your search for understanding.
Ah … the disciples of the Great and Powerful Flying Spaghetti Monster! You know, I’ve seen pictures. Pictures are PROOF!
Well…Very interesting “debate”, although I can’t really understand why people have such correspondences. Why can’t everyone believe in what they want to believe, and leave everyone else alone? Why do atheists have to prove to believers that god doesn’t exist, and vice versa? Nobody benefits from these exchanges, and it gets people more worked up. Everyone should be free to express their opinions about god, and not fear being criticized for it.
In my opinion, it doesn’t matter whether you believe in a supreme power that set up moral codes and live by those, or you have good moral ethics w/o any religious stigma attached to them and live by those morals. The only thing that matters is that people should evaluate themselves and see where they could improve themselves to become better people, and not worry about what other people believe/do…Religion is one way of doing it, laws and regulations are another, and spirituality/mysticism yet another…I think the world would be a much better place if people did not concern themselves with what others believed in and tried to convince people their was was the bet way…
Maybe this wasn’t something directly mentioned in the “debate” but I hate the way religious zealots use the word “secular”. I do not want religion to become a part of governmental agenda. But since when did “secular” started meaning “doesn’t believe in god/doesn’t live by good morals”…Most people who believe in a secular system do not claim god doesn’t exist. A secular system ensures everyone practices what they want to practice, w/o one single thing being shoved down your throat as government agenda. Nonsecular systems lead to intolerance with regards to diversity of religion (Saudi Arabia anyone? Or Iran? Helloooo??? Doesn’t anyone remember the crusades???) and breeds hate. (I am sad to see this already happening in the States.) Keeping religion out of politics/government etc. is therefore good policy, besides, there are so many people who are not Christians in this country. Whose (or which) religion is going to be the basis for a “non-secular” way of governing, and isn’t it unfair to those who hold other beliefs? What about freedom of belief???
Another thing that ticked me off is that Dennis Prager keeps saying atheists believe things “just happen coincidentally” in nature…Well, I hardly suspect scientists believe in “coincidences”, and I am surprised Harris doesn’t address this. The only reason scientists are looking for answers is to be able to explain things, not to claim things happen by coincidences…Like the process for evolution being survival of the fittest, not coincidence. These things baffle me, we can talk about bacteria that mutate and become resistant to antibiotics (even overly religious people believe this…and this is clearly a form of “survival of the fittest”), yet can’t open up our minds even one bit to scientific truths. What if god designed humans to evolve? Can we fight science with blind faith? Why can’t someone believe in god and also believe in scientific progress/explanations? Why do we have to be one or the other (yes I know why, but why???)? If the book says the earth is flat and the sun revolves around Earth, and we know these to be proven false by science by now (uhmmm..anyone believe that the Earth is flat because the Bible Says so?), isn’t it possible that maybe Adam and Eve did not exist? That the Earth was maybe not created in 6 days? People get so worried that their church will lose it’s power and thus lose “funding”…Precious money..Oh wait! The same panic happened hundreds of years ago, when Galileo claimed the sun does not revolve around Earth!!!Yup…
Another thing that ticks me off is the portrayal of Muslims and Islam whenever religious subjects come up. The fact is that majority of Muslims are not war-raging, jihad-claiming psychopaths, yet an atheist and religious zealot can come together as in this debate and talk about them as such. This is really sad. Yes there are psychopaths who claim they are doing god’s work by claiming jihad on this and that, but let’s see them for what they are: Psychopaths…Surely these people cannot be associated with any type of belief system in it’s intended form. We should leave our prejudices and the stereotype tapes that play in our heads, and see people for who they are, rather than what they believe in.
People have fought hard during the times of Reform in Europe to separate church and state…I don’t think there is any reason to go back and visit the dark ages, it clearly was not a very pleasant world to live in…But I’m not surprised…History does repeat itself after all…
But I digress…What I’m trying to say is that we have to learn to live together and be tolerant and respectful of other people’s beliefs or lack of beliefs…Personally, for me, the only thing that matters is how I myself can be a better person and better serve the world I live in. In my humble opinion, we should all concern ourselves with this, and keep religion as a “private” matter whether we use it to accomplish our goals or not. I am sure the world would be a much better place then…
Why do atheists have to prove to believers that god doesn’t exist, and vice versa?
I am having trouble with converse of a question, but if it is what I think it should be: “Why do believers have to prove to atheists that god doesn’t exist?”, which would imply that they do try, then we wouldn’t be having this discussion at all
Also, -Pi clearly hasn’t read the book. I do not necessarily agree with all the arguments within, and some of the points that -Pi mentioned did irk me as well, but it does offer a fairly eloquent answer to:
Why can’t everyone believe in what they want to believe, and leave everyone else alone?
I am currently spending time on The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins which may be more to my liking. The jury is still out.
Just as I feared, I managed to “irk” someone with my comment…
To clarify things a bit:
-Yes I haven’t read the book (maybe I should), everything I was mentioning was in response to what I have read in the link that was provided…The back and forth correspondence between Harris and Prager…
-I do not associate myself with any religion or belief system…And am agnostic…
-What I meant by vice versa was “Why do believers have to prove to atheists that god DOES exist?” (I think this is what e was trying to say, too), and I agree we wouldn’t be having this argument if they weren’t…Maybe I should’ve written it other way around…
-Some of my questions/ponderings were rhetorical…
-I am not opposed to people who believe (I believe religion fulfills a great void for most people) as long as they don’t try to convince me to believe theirs is the right way…I do understand the use of the word “zealot” might be irksome, too, but only people who are intolerant of others’ beliefs fall in that category for me…Yes, I am intolerant of people who are intolerant…But that’s different…So I don’t really understand how what I wrote answers “Why can’t everyone believe in what they want to believe, and leave everyone else alone?”… Maybe I am not good at using words to get across what I am trying to say…I’d be happy to provide a detailed explanation for whatever is irksome about my post, if I knew which part of it was irksome.
I hate getting into such debates…
-I was scared I was going to be offending someone by posting a reply.
-Pi,
I know what you meant by “vice versa”, I was just trying to be clever in a nerdy kind of way. Never mind that.
So sorry, you misunderstood me. I was not clear enough. Some of the points you brought up irked me as well while I was reading the book. It was nothing you said, but few things that Harris said.
And, no, what you wrote does not answer the question you asked, but things Harris wrote do
And, no, you did not offend me. I don’t get easily offended. Just for the record, I am agnostic myself. I think being tolerant is fine, but being correct is starting to cost too much. If the religion is seeping into the everyday life of all of us, and religious people have no problem with that, then I do not see why they would have a problem with our questioning their beliefs. Anyway, Harris is much more eloquent than I am, and although some of his arguments are little agressive, I’d still recommend the book.
e,
I can’t tell you how relieved I am to know that you’re not offended by what I wrote. I apologize because I seem to have misunderstood what you were trying to say. That’s the worst thing about written communication, things sometimes get read or interpreted the wrong way (unintentionally).
You said: “If the religion is seeping into the everyday life of all of us, and religious people have no problem with that, then I do not see why they would have a problem with our questioning their beliefs.”
I totally agree with that, and also with the fact that if they left the “unbelievers” alone to begin with and stopped playing “savior”, there wouldn’t be a need to confront them. But when confrontation does occur, I could go with scientific facts, and they would reply with “because my book says so”…And how can I reply back to that? To me, that’s not a “debate”…Hence my question I asked before: Can we fight science with blind faith? I believe not, and both sides get offended and worked up as a result. Thus my point, we should just leave them alone and they should leave us alone (but they don’t…you’re right). I have read all the “holy” books, and they may have some good principles, but I really can’t say one clearly stood out as the “truth” to me. And I strongly believe that if people opened up their minds and subjected themselves to different points of views, most people would be the same way. I did not grow up in a religious family, and I think I turned out OK as a person. I can very comfortably say I live by higher morals than most people who believe. But I am not trying to say believers are bad people or have bad morals at all…It’s just a preference I guess, as long as they don’t think they’re “better”. I would never go up to a person and say “so you believe in god??? but have you realized this and that doesn’t make sense???” And I am hoping some day they will be able to do the same.
Eric, I am so sorry I seem to be hogging up your comments space.
But you know me and what I think/believe…I also feel a little weird, because I have never gone “public” with this stuff before!!!
Alright, here are a few final comments…I have difficulty understanding how many of the people (OK not all) who preach loudly about “Peace on Earth, Good Will Towards Men” during Christmas time are the same people who support war. I don’t understand why we get puzzled by Muslims who get worked up over some cartoons depicting their prophet (something that’s apparently a big taboo for them), yet NBC will not show Madonna on the cross when it airs her concert on TV, scared it will be offensive to a lot of people, and most people who are puzzled by the anger of Muslims are OK with that. There seems to be some kind of double-standard here. Isn’t that hypocrisy???
I believe we have too many “worldly” problems here on earth, like poverty, world hunger, finding a cure for cancer and AIDS etc. to be concerned with “other worldly” problems this much as a society. There is someone dying out there on the street corner of hunger, and what have we done for him today? I think people should use their time and energy for better things, and let religious practices be private matters.
-Pi says:
“In my opinion, it doesn’t matter whether you believe in a supreme power that set up moral codes and live by those”
It matters tremendously. To do as you endorse is confusion.
I wish somebody would do surveys that investigate the overlaps between the categories you mention above. I am not sure that it is done, because it could be construed as not being respectful and/or tolerant. And nobody wants to be accused of that (does it seem like we’re running in circles?).
I, too, offer my apologies for what currently seems like a conversation between Pi and e. Here is a “seeping comment”, and we can continue conversation there if there is any interest.
Best,
e
Peter can you elaborate on that a little bit?
If you take only that part of that complete sentence, then yeah it does sound different than what I was trying to say. 
-Pi says:
“If you take only that part of that complete sentence, then yeah it does sound different than what I was trying to say.”
Here is your full sentence and an attempt to clarify my point -
“In my opinion, it doesn’t matter whether you believe in a supreme power that set up moral codes and live by those, or you have good moral ethics w/o any religious stigma attached to them and live by those morals.”
You seem to present two choices here and believe that either approach is valid. I disagree with this. The first approach implies the handing over of one’s moral and ethical authority to another (a “supreme power” in this case) to be OK. I disagree.
Can you please clarify what you mean by the alternative?
I sense we may be on the same wavelength, but some of the wording of the second approach I find awkward (e.g. “live by those morals” to me should say “live morally”) To say “live by” may indicate a dependence upon some formula or system though perhaps you don’t mean to imply this. We cannot base our moral/ethical action on a formula. If we do, we are surely to breed conflict. Sure, one can base the action of, say, walking to a friend’s house (i.e. the formula is the path there) on a pattern, but there is nothing ethical about that. However, when we look to organized religion to guide our morality surely we are going to breed confusion. This is what is happening in the world right now, is it not?
To sum up, I don’t think the choice between “follow God” and “know yourself” to be equally valid paths. The latter can actually be investigated - though there is no concrete/formulaic “how”. The former is done out of fear and is therefore at best useless, and at worst harmful. The belief that some”"supreme power” has “set up moral codes” is absolutely absurd.
Peter you’re right…I guess what I was thinking by the word “moral” was “being a decent human being” which to me does not constitute killing others, etc even if a book says so (living morally as you correctly put it)….I always think for some reason people should be smart enough to distinguish those things. You’re absolutely right, when it looks like it comes from a supreme power and ppl follow it word by word because they’re scared, it does cause confusion, and it is happening in the world. And that is why I, myself, do not like organized religion (and for many other reasons), either…
Ugh, although, I have to say this, and it may be totally different but to me it looks similar… Most ppl follow laws and regulations because they are scared and not because they want to, either, (ok no law or regulation this day says don’t tolerate and go kill people who hold different beliefs about things (well there are a lot of questionable things about some countries’ foreign and internal policies though, it sure looks like they’re doing this) and we’ll reward you, and they are put in place by some sort of “supreme” though not divine power) but they help keep a lot of things under control by scaring people with penalties. And I think those books attempted to do that back thousand of years ago, and surely cannot apply to today’s world. To me, therein lies the difference. There’s a lot of good stuff in the books, too, and unfortunately, some ppl are far from “knowing themselves” and need something bigger to save themselves. Majority of believers I don’t think practice the questionable parts or take them literally. Those that do (those raised in terrorist camps, jesus camps, etc.) are, I agree, very dangerous, a threat to humanity, and we’d like to believe if religion wasn’t there, they’d be peace loving, decent people.
I’m not trying to defend religion at all, although it may look like it, (if anyone knew me personally a bit they’d know that) but I disagree with Harris when he says if we get rid of religion there won’t be terror. Sure, there’ll be less terror for a little while, until ppl come up with something else…Say Arabs vs. Americans, instead of religious differences. I think my main point is that. Yes religion is causing a lot of pain, and breeds hatred among people…But there are millions and millions of believers who actually believe this is the word of god w/o becoming or supporting terrorists. We can question their beliefs but can we tell them “you will NOT believe in this anymore”? That was what I was trying to say before I actually got to know what Harris was actually saying.
Thank you for your reply, sometimes I’m not even sure what I’m trying to say myself, it’s so hard to put it in writing and it doesn’t come out exactly as I want to say it.
(not to mention English is not my native language.)
-Pi says
“You’re absolutely right, when it looks like it comes from a supreme power and ppl follow it word by word because they’re scared, it does cause confusion, and it is happening in the world.”
What is it that sometimes “looks like it comes from a supreme power”?
Following dogma is confusion, not the cause. If we prop confusion itself up at the culprit, we are in danger of thinking - “Well, if I keep searching, then eventually I’ll find the right way.” But if we approach the problem in this manner, what happens in the meantime? There is nothing wrong with confusion (who isn’t confused?), the key is simply to see it, no? If I see it, then it isn’t a problem as I won’t act through it.
Peter,
You asked: What is it that sometimes “looks like it comes from a supreme power”?
I meant “ppl who think what’s written in the books is coming from a supreme power”…There’s no sometimes there…It doesn’t sometimes look that way, to these ppl it looks like it’s coming from a supreme power.
The reason I used “cause” was because you said this:
“However, when we look to organized religion to guide our morality surely we are going to breed confusion.”
Breed confusion, cause confusion, they don’t sound that different to me, and that’s what I was referring to…
But I am confused now.
This whole paragraph was too much for my brain to handle at this late hour, maybe I should sleep on it and come back…
“Following dogma is confusion, not the cause. If we prop confusion itself up at the culprit, we are in danger of thinking - “Well, if I keep searching, then eventually I’ll find the right way.” But if we approach the problem in this manner, what happens in the meantime? There is nothing wrong with confusion (who isn’t confused?), the key is simply to see it, no? If I see it, then it isn’t a problem as I won’t act through it.”
I think I sort of get it…Confused people follow dogma, following dogma isn’t what causes confusion…Confused ppl, as long as they know they’re confused, will not act on dogmatic beliefs…Was that it? Am I getting it right? Maybe not…
And also, it’s very possible to make up and “live by” your own morals…These are some of the morals that I live by that weren’t handed down to me by any dogmatic system:
-I will never kill someone
-I will help those who need my help
-I will always try to keep an open mind and non-judgmental attitude towards people, and many more…
You said “We cannot base our moral/ethical action on a formula.”
Well the above are a part of my own formula, and it is very much like walking towards a friend’s house, except that I call the pathway “life”…Don’t you have your own morals that you live by or follow? If not, how do you distinguish between right and wrong?
I do think we’re on the same wavelength as far as the way we think goes. But I think you’re reading too much in between the lines of what I’m trying to say, or getting hung up on the way I phrase things (probably unintentionally). I don’t play with words. I think the big picture I’m talking about is very clear.
Cheers!
-Pi
“The reason I used “cause” was because you said this:”
Ahh yes.
” I think you’re reading too much in between the lines of what I’m trying to say, or getting hung up on the way I phrase things ”
Yes, you are right. I’m often hyper-sensitive to the choice of words used and failed to see how I actually brought that about myself. My bad. Thank you for pointing this out.
“Don’t you have your own morals that you live by or follow?”
I don’t know.